A floating pet toy may enable pet owners to play fetch their pets, particularly dogs, in the water as well as on land. In addition, a floating pet toy may be used by certain pet owners to train their dogs to retrieve wild game/animals shot during hunting, particularly water fowl which have been shot over water.
As such, the pet toy must be sufficiently buoyant for the animal to locate, as well as sufficiently durable to be repeated used.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,904,118 to Markham discloses a floatable pet toy including a hollow deformable body with a buoyant material in the form of a closed cell foam inside of the body. Markham sets forth that the foam increases the pet toy's buoyancy and resistance to deformation for durability. However, while Markham may set forth that the foam increases resistance to deformation, the resistance offered by the foam may be understood to be limited, particularly given then foam is easily compressible as shown in FIG. 3 and may comprise light weight packing material such as packing peanuts.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,011,325 to Jager discloses a floatable pet toy which makes use of an airtight buoyant floatation bladder. However, if the bladder is punctured the toy may be understood to lose its floatation ability.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,474,410 to Oblack discloses a resilient animal throw-toy with a buoyant interior member. The throw-toys are disc-shaped as well as boomerang-shaped. However, due to the shape of the throw-toys such may be expected to be difficult for a pet to locate in the water.
As such, there is still a need to improve upon floating pet toys. What is need is a floating pet toy which is durable and easy for a pet to locate in the water.